Henri VI (3/3)
1595
Henri VI (3/3)
1595
Translated by François Guizot
Henry VI, Part 3 is Shakespeare's bloodiest play, a relentless descent into the chaos of civil war. Picking up where Part 2 leaves off, it charts the catastrophic collapse of order as the Houses of York and Lancaster tear England apart over the rose. The white rose of York and the red rose of Lancaster become blood badges, and the throne passes between them with dizzying, brutal speed. King Henry VI, weak and devotional, wanders through his own kingdom like a ghost, increasingly powerless as the man he calls cousin and the queen he married battle for the crown he wears. Queen Margaret emerges as the play's most terrifying figure: a French-born queen who becomes England's fiercest warrior, leading armies against her own husband's enemies with a ferocity that shocks even her contemporaries. What makes this play endure is its clear-eyed vision of what political ambition costs. The dead pile up. Loyalty proves meaningless. Even victory brings no peace. It's Shakespeare at his most savage, showing us how easily a kingdom murders itself.
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“From this day to the ending of the world,But we in it shall be remembered-We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;For he to-day that sheds his blood with meShall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,This day shall gentle his condition;And gentlemen in England now-a-bedShall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaksThat fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.””
— William Shakespeare
“Thine face is not worth sunburning.””
— William Shakespeare
“All things are ready, if our mind be so.””
— William Shakespeare
“Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;Or close the wall up with our English dead.In peace there's nothing so becomes a manAs modest stillness and humility:But when the blast of war blows in our ears,Then imitate the action of the tiger;Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage;Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;Let pry through the portage of the headLike the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm itAs fearfully as doth a galled rockO'erhang and jutty his confounded base,Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean.Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,Hold hard the breath and bend up every spiritTo his full height. On, on, you noblest English.Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,Have in these parts from morn till even foughtAnd sheathed their swords for lack of argument:Dishonour not your mothers; now attestThat those whom you call'd fathers did beget you.Be copy now to men of grosser blood,And teach them how to war. And you, good yeoman,Whose limbs were made in England, show us hereThe mettle of your pasture; let us swearThat you are worth your breeding; which I doubt not;For there is none of you so mean and base,That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,Straining upon the start. The game's afoot:Follow your spirit, and upon this chargeCry 'God for Harry, England, and Saint George!””
— William Shakespeare
“Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin, as self-neglecting.””
— William Shakespeare
“When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes. ””
— William Shakespeare
“Men of few words are the best men."(3.2.41)””
— William Shakespeare
“You have witchcraft in your lips, there is more eloquence in a sugar touch of them than in the tongues of the French council; and they shouldsooner persuade Harry of England than a general petition of monarchs.””
— William Shakespeare
“In peace there's nothing so becomes a man as modest stillness and humility; but when the blast of war blows in our ears, then imitate the action of the tiger; stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, disguise fair nature with hard-favor'd rage.””
— William Shakespeare
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Shakespeare, William. Henri VI (3/3). Lex, lex-books.com/book/henri-vi-3-3-1c095a2b-6754-42c8-8b67-61e4b2ee30d9.Shakespeare, W. (1595). Henri VI (3/3). Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/henri-vi-3-3-1c095a2b-6754-42c8-8b67-61e4b2ee30d9Shakespeare, William. Henri VI (3/3). Lex. https://lex-books.com/book/henri-vi-3-3-1c095a2b-6754-42c8-8b67-61e4b2ee30d9.


































